The season opened on a brisk chilly afternoon when Nantwich travelled to Alderley Edge in what turned out to be a relatively dramatic encounter in the closing overs.

It started with Alderley Edge winning the toss, deciding to bat and found themselves up against it at 37-2 with both Mark Currie and Steve O'Shaunhessey back in the warmth of the pavilion.

The former had made ten runs and the latter only five. Thereafter their batting quivered into life.

All the Edge batsmen got into double figures and then departed the arena - with the exception of Jon Usher, who reached 36 before holing out to deep deep 'mid off' when a half century was there for the taking.

The other exception was Andy Wright, who was calm and marginally collected and batted with good sense.

He will have been disappointed to have just missed his 'half hundred' with 47.

The reality was that AE foundered on the pace and accuracy of Nantwich's quickie, Barrington Brown, who in 17 overs undid them with six wickets for 63 runs.

Alderley Edge reached 202 all out by the 51st over and will have felt that they had not done enough, particularly as Nantwich had 59 overs at their disposal to reach AE's target.

Nantwich's response to the challenge was amicable and without urgency, until it all came to a head in the 49th over. With seven wickets down, Nantwich were 46 runs short of AE's target with 10 overs left.

However, standing between AE and glory was Mark Bentham, who had come to the wicket at number six and had set out his stall to protect his 'tail enders' from the wiles of O'Shaunhessy and Bolton.

He had batted for the best part of 60 balls to reach 33.

Captain Manlow brought Julian Scarsbrook back into the attack and the over he used to loosen up proved the turning point.

Bentham took 15 runs off him in two overs, and a further 17 off Shaunhessy in his two overs - and that was that. Nantwich had got home with four overs to spare.

The little chap ended his game with 61 match winning runs but leaving AE with 14 points. The AE wicket played beautifully, which was a credit to Alan Gibson, the AE groundsman, and his side-kick Cliff Shepley.